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Reischek's Parakeet
Reischek's parakeet (''Cyanoramphus hochstetteri'') is a small green parrot confined to Antipodes Island, one of New Zealand’s subantarctic islands, which it shares with a congener, the larger Antipodes parakeet. Taxonomy The common name commemorates pioneering naturalist and collector Andreas Reischek, who collected specimens of the parrot in 1888 and who named it ''Platycercus hochstetteri'' for the son of his friend, Austrian geologist Ferdinand von Hochstetter, who made a geological survey of New Zealand. Reischek’s parakeet was previously considered to be a subspecies of the red-crowned parakeet ''C. novaezelandiae'', which it resembles in appearance, but was later lumped with the Macquarie parakeet from Macquarie Island in a 2001 paper by Wee Ming Boon and others following an examination of the molecular systematics of the genus which found that many of the red-crowned parakeet subspecies should be elevated to full species.Boon, Wee Ming; Kearvell, Jonathan C.; Daugher ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andreas Reischek
Andreas Reischek (15 September 1845 – 3 April 1902) was an Austrian taxidermist, naturalist, ornithologist and grave robber notable for his extensive natural history collecting expeditions throughout New Zealand as well as being notorious for acts of grave robbing there. He added materially to the understanding of the biology and distribution of the New Zealand avifauna.Westerskov, K.E. (1990). "Andreas Reischek, 1845-1902". pp.191-193 in ''A Flying Start. Commemorating Fifty Years of the Ornithological Society of New Zealand'', ed. B.J. Gill & B.D. Heather. Random Century: Auckland. Early years Reischek was born in Linz, Austria. After attending school for a few years he worked as an apprentice to a baker and developed a strong interest in natural history, also becoming skilled in taxidermy. He saw war service in Tyrol in 1866 during the Third Italian War of Independence and also served as a gamekeeper and guide before working as a taxidermist in Vienna. He married Adelhe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guano
Guano (Spanish from qu, wanu) is the accumulated excrement of seabirds or bats. As a manure, guano is a highly effective fertilizer due to the high content of nitrogen, phosphate, and potassium, all key nutrients essential for plant growth. Guano was also, to a lesser extent, sought for the production of gunpowder and other explosive materials. The 19th-century seabird guano trade played a pivotal role in the development of modern input-intensive farming. The demand for guano spurred the human colonization of remote bird islands in many parts of the world. Unsustainable seabird guano mining processes can result in permanent habitat destruction and the loss of millions of seabirds. Bat guano is found in caves throughout the world. Many cave ecosystems are wholly dependent on bats to provide nutrients via their guano which supports bacteria, fungi, invertebrates, and vertebrates. The loss of bats from a cave can result in the extinction of species that rely on their guano. U ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Endemic Birds Of New Zealand
Many of New Zealand's birds are endemic to the country, that is, they are not found in any other country. Approximately 71% of the bird species breeding in New Zealand before humans arrived are widely accepted as being endemic. There is also a smaller group of species are not fully endemic, but are breeding endemic, in that they breed only in New Zealand, but migrate or range elsewhere. Population status symbols are those of the Red List published by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.''The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species''. Version 2017-1 . Accessed 23 May 2017 The symbols and their meanings, in increasing order of peril, are: = least concern = near threatened = vulnerable = endangered = critically endangered = extinct Endemic Bird Areas BirdLife International has defined the following Endemic Bird Areas (EBAs) in New Zealand: * Auckland Islands * Chatham Islands * North Island of New Zealand * South Island of New Zealand In addition the follo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Birds Of The Antipodes Islands
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the bee hummingbird to the ostrich. There are about ten thousand living species, more than half of which are passerine, or "perching" birds. Birds have whose development varies according to species; the only known groups without wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds. Wings, which are modified forelimbs, gave birds the ability to fly, although further evolution has led to the loss of flight in some birds, including ratites, penguins, and diverse endemic island species. The digestive and respiratory systems of birds are also uniquely adapted for flight. Some bird species of aquatic environments, particularly seabirds and some waterbirds, have further evolved for swimming. Birds ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cyanoramphus
''Cyanoramphus'' is a genus of parakeets native to New Zealand and islands of the southern Pacific Ocean. The New Zealand forms are often referred to as kākāriki. They are small to medium-sized parakeets with long tails and predominantly green plumage. Most species are forest species, although several of the subantarctic species live in open grassland. The genus formerly had a disjunct distribution, with two species found in the Society Islands and the majority of the genus ranging from New Caledonia to Macquarie Island, but absent from the in between. Despite many fossil birds being found in the islands between these two areas being found none of these were of undescribed ''Cyanoramphus'' species. Like many other species of birds the ''Cyanoramphus'' parakeets have suffered from changes brought about by humans. The two species from the Society Islands, the black-fronted parakeet and the Society parakeet, have become extinct as have the subspecies from Lord Howe Island and Mac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Albatross
Albatrosses, of the biological family Diomedeidae, are large seabirds related to the procellariids, storm petrels, and diving petrels in the order Procellariiformes (the tubenoses). They range widely in the Southern Ocean and the North Pacific. They are absent from the North Atlantic, although fossil remains show they once occurred there and occasional vagrants are found. Albatrosses are among the largest of flying birds, and species of the genus ''Diomedea'' (great albatrosses) have the longest wingspans of any extant birds, reaching up to . The albatrosses are usually regarded as falling into four genera, but disagreement exists over the number of species. Albatrosses are highly efficient in the air, using dynamic soaring and slope soaring to cover great distances with little exertion. They feed on squid, fish, and krill by either scavenging, surface seizing, or diving. Albatrosses are colonial, nesting for the most part on remote oceanic islands, often with several spe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carrion
Carrion () is the decaying flesh of dead animals, including human flesh. Overview Carrion is an important food source for large carnivores and omnivores in most ecosystems. Examples of carrion-eaters (or scavengers) include crows, vultures, condors, hawks, eagles, hyenas, Virginia opossum, Tasmanian devils, coyotes and Komodo dragons. Many invertebrates, such as the carrion and burying beetles, as well as maggots of calliphorid flies (such as one of the most important species in '' Calliphora vomitoria'') and flesh-flies, also eat carrion, playing an important role in recycling nitrogen and carbon in animal remains. Carrion begins to decay at the moment of the animal's death, and it will increasingly attract insects and breed bacteria. Not long after the animal has died, its body will begin to exude a foul odor caused by the presence of bacteria and the emission of cadaverine and putrescine. Some plants and fungi smell like decomposing carrion and attract insects that a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seabird Colony
A bird colony is a large congregation of individuals of one or more species of bird that nest or roost in proximity at a particular location. Many kinds of birds are known to congregate in groups of varying size; a congregation of nesting birds is called a breeding colony. Colonial nesting birds include seabirds such as auks and albatrosses; wetland species such as herons; and a few passerines such as weaverbirds, certain blackbirds, and some swallows. A group of birds congregating for rest is called a communal roost. Evidence of colonial nesting has been found in non- neornithine birds ( Enantiornithes), in sediments from the Late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) of Romania. Variations on colonial nesting in birds Approximately 13% of all bird species nest colonially. Nesting colonies are very common among seabirds on cliffs and islands. Nearly 95% of seabirds are colonial, leading to the usage, seabird colony, sometimes called a rookery. Many species of terns nest in colonies ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Larva
A larva (; plural larvae ) is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle. The larva's appearance is generally very different from the adult form (''e.g.'' caterpillars and butterflies) including different unique structures and organs that do not occur in the adult form. Their diet may also be considerably different. Larvae are frequently adapted to different environments than adults. For example, some larvae such as tadpoles live almost exclusively in aquatic environments, but can live outside water as adult frogs. By living in a distinct environment, larvae may be given shelter from predators and reduce competition for resources with the adult population. Animals in the larval stage will consume food to fuel their transition into the adult form. In some organisms like polychaetes and barnacles, adults are immobil ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antipodes Islands
The Antipodes Islands ( Maōri: Moutere Mahue; "Abandoned island") are inhospitable and uninhabited volcanic islands in subantarctic waters to the south of – and territorially part of – New Zealand. The 21 km2 archipelago lies 860 km to the southeast of Stewart Island/Rakiura, and 730 km to the northeast of Campbell Island. They are very close to being the antipodal point to Normandy in France, meaning that the city farthest away is Cherbourg-en-Cotentin, France. The island group consists of one main island, Antipodes Island, of 20 km2 area, Bollons Island to the north, and numerous small islets and stacks. The islands are listed with the New Zealand Outlying Islands. The islands are an immediate part of New Zealand, but not part of any region or district, but instead ''Area Outside Territorial Authority'', like all the other outlying islands except the Solander Islands. Ecologically, the islands are part of the Antipodes Subantarctic Islands tundr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Macquarie Island
Macquarie Island is an island in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, about halfway between New Zealand and Antarctica. Regionally part of Oceania and politically a part of Tasmania, Australia, since 1900, it became a Tasmanian State Reserve in 1978 and was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997. It was a part of Esperance Municipality until 1993, when the municipality was merged with other municipalities to form Huon Valley Council. The island is home to the entire royal penguin population during their annual nesting season. Ecologically, the island is part of the Antipodes Subantarctic Islands tundra ecoregion. Since 1948, the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD) has maintained a permanent base, the Macquarie Island Station, on the isthmus at the northern end of the island at the foot of Wireless Hill. The population of the base, constituting the island's only human inhabitants, usually varies from 20 to 40 people over the year. A heliport is located nearby. In Septemb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Macquarie Parakeet
The Macquarie parakeet (''Cyanoramphus erythrotis''), also known as the Macquarie Island parakeet, is an extinct parrot from subantarctic Macquarie Island, an outlying part of Tasmania, Australia, in the Southern Ocean. Taxonomy The Macquarie parakeet was previously considered to be a subspecies of the red-fronted parakeet ''C. novaezelandiae'', which it resembled in appearance, but was later lumped with Reischek's parakeet from the Antipodes Islands in a 2001 paper by Wee Ming Boon and others following an examination of the molecular systematics of the genus which found that many of the red-crowned parakeet subspecies should be elevated to full species.Boon, Wee Ming; Kearvell, Jonathan C.; Daugherty, Charles H.; & Chambers, Geoffrey K. (2001). Molecular systematics and conservation of kakariki (''Cyanoramphus spp.''). ''Science for Conservation'' 176. Dept of Conservation:Wellington, New Zealand. However, subsequently the provenance of Boon ''et al.''’s supposed Macquarie I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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